vs
FC Barcelona vs FC Bayern Munich
Camp Nou (Barcelona) | Wed, May 6 | 20:45 CET


After recording one of the biggest away league wins in Spanish league history at the weekend, Barca will now turn its attentions fully onto the highly anticipated semifinal clash in the Champions League with reigning German champions Bayern Munich with the biggest headline of the meeting being Pep Guardiola's return to Camp Nou for the first time as a manager since departing from the Catalan club in 2012.

It will also serve as an opportunity for Barca to avenge the painful 7-0 aggregate defeat in 2013 to the same side who went on to win the treble that season and boost their own hopes of a treble this year in Luis Enrique's first season at the helm of the team. Still a long way to go before such ambitions could actually be realized, but all well within reach as we go into the final month of the campaign.

Whilst Barcelona can enjoy a clean bill of health and be able to call upon all 23 first team members for this game, Bayern on the other hand are facing many problems in the lead up to this meeting. Robben, Badstuber, and Alaba are out for the entire tie whilst there are still concerns over the availability of Ribery and Lewandowski. It's almost an opposite situation for the two teams in comparison to the way both were going into the semifinal games two years ago, form and squad selection wise.

Many were doubtful as to whether or not this Barca could tackle the best in Europe and challenge for the cup with the big ears earlier this year, but things have changed since and many will actually be viewing Barca as the favorites to reach the final in Berlin considering Bayern's current situation. However, there is no doubting that there is still a tough task at hand against a team possessing multiple World Cup winners in their ranks and that it will take a big effort to topple them and make it to the showpiece final in a month's time.

It's the biggest challenge yet of Lucho's reign as Barca manager and one where he will do well to succeed and earn his money in the managing business by defeating the man he's constantly compared to on a daily basis since he took the job of coaching the Blaugrana. It promises to be a great footballing match with plenty of storylines set to unfold as the road to Berlin heats up for both of these two great sides.

My predicted lineup:

ter Stegen
Alves --- Pique --- Mascherano --- Alba
Rakitic --- Busquets --- Iniesta
Messi --- Suarez --- Neymar

Homework (throughout the season )are over...time for the real test
would be interesting to see pep's strategy for Messi. first time he would be doing something to stop him rather than taking advantage of him. luckily Messi's game has changed since pep left. also our playing style is quite different from what he used to do. Otherwise i would be sure of Pep coming up with a solution.

Huge game. I'm not worried about Pep closing down Messi because there's also Suarez and Neymar and they can't contain them all at once. I think we will do just fine and be motivated more than ever. One is certain - we'll witness a brilliant game of football.

Thinking about going to work 1.5 hours early so I can get out and watch this

I never pass up a chance to play football to watch it instead, even Barcelona...but this is an exception for sure.

So many juicy individual battles going on.

My body is ready.

cant believe FCB is trolling in twitter from official account
seems like they are not as humble as minority hans

Mathieu out of the game. 2 CB signings later and we are still playing Pique Masche

Mascherano to be outheaded by Lewandowski, mispositionedby himself and beaten by random long balls.

Plesase LE, start Bartra.

Why what was said on Twitter?

windkick wrote:Why what was said on Twitter?

tweeted a video with title "Are you ready for this??" where thiago is showing some high school tricks that our onloan Deulofeu does better....

Shit i need to see this

I saw a skills video, but it was with Neymar and Messi

https://twitter.com/FCBayernEN/status/595158978784407553

Well, this is one team i wanted to avoid, but there is no better time to play them than now!

linetty wrote:One is certain - we'll witness a brilliant game of football.

BarrileteCosmico wrote:Thinking about going to work 1.5 hours early so I can get out and watch this

The Franchise wrote:I never pass up a chance to play football to watch it instead, even Barcelona...but this is an exception for sure.

windkick wrote:So many juicy individual battles going on.

My body is ready.

Inb4 it's a mistake-ridden snoozefest

Doubt it. The ref is quality and then there's two best possession teams trying to win the possession battle. Nah

Even Real is now a better possession team than you tbh

I dont think its possible for it to be a boring match. I cant picture a game without chances being made, neither side are comfortable with an opponent having long spells of possession and both will have moments where that happens.

Hapless_Hans wrote:Even Real is now a better possession team than you tbh

Average possession: Bayern (71%), Barcelona (70%), PSG (64%).

BarrileteCosmico wrote:https://twitter.com/FCBayernEN/status/595158978784407553

Oh f them. Trying to rub it in our face that they have Thiago by showing him doing some tricks most guys on our team can also do? Stupid shit
This really annoys me. I was just happy to be at this stage after the way we've played at times this season and the fact we won nothing last season. But now I want us to beat them.

eelir wrote:Well, this is one team i wanted to avoid, but there is no better time to play them than now!

As a Barca fan it's a big advantage that Arjen Robben is out of the game but as a fan of the beautiful game it's lamentable.

Hapless_Hans wrote:Even Real is now a better possession team than you tbh

Are you sure you'll beat us on the possession statistics at the end of the game?

I read an article by 'Sid Lowe' about how there are fragments within Barcelona who hate Pep Guardiola and will not welcome him warmly. Maybe I'll share the link some time as I don't have it now.

My prediction for this game :-


Barcelona(4) - Bayern(2)